Track Ledger

Category : College


13 January 2020	Texas State Hall of Famer Inez Turner Excels at Fayetteville State 265 By O'Neil A. Reid Inez Turner, the head Track and Field coach at Fayetteville State University, has lots of trophies and awards in her office. Two Thousand and Nineteen was a spectacular year for the former Vere Technical High School (Jamaica) track star. During 2019, Inez was inducted into the Texas State University Hall of Fame; she had her 5th induction on the Penn Relays Wall of Fame and won her 12th CIAA Coach of the Year title. Coach Turner, who hails from Trelawny, Jamaica, is no stranger to track and field. She has competed and represented her island nation at all levels of competition from the regional CARIFTA Games to the Olympics. Inez won gold in the 800m at the 1994 Commonwealth Games in Victoria, Canada and has the distinction of becoming the first Caribbean woman to go sub-2 minutes in the 800m, when she ran 1:59.49 in 1995. She was also a 2-time NCAA champion at Texas State University. After spending several years at Winston-....
17 January 2017	Bloomfield Runs World Leading 46.68 in 400m 265 By O'Neil A Reid Jamaican national junior 400m record holder, Akeem Bloomfield and freshman at Auburn University, ran a world-leading time of 46.68 seconds at the Commodore Invitational in Nashville, Tennessee this past Saturday (Jan 14). Bloomfield, a 6’5” graduate of Kingston College (Jamaica), was impressive in his first collegiate indoor 400m race, winning Heat 1 in 46.68 seconds, ahead of Tennessee’s Ari Codgell (46.89) and Alabama’s Skyler Bowden (47.66). Armed with a personal best time of 44.93 seconds in the event, Bloomfield has taken his first step to his expected rise in the USA Collegiate circuit. The Software Engineering major is coached by Henry Rolle. Bloomfield’s teammate, Raheem Chambers, won his 60m heat in 6.72 seconds to finished 3rd overall behind Christian Coleman (6.56) and Mustaqeem Williams (6.69), both of the University of Tennessee. Chambers who hails from Spanish Town, Jamaica, had a stellar high sch....
20 December 2009	Essex County's Coach Smart Has Caribbean Pipeline 265 By American coach Michael Smart, the East Orange, New Jersey native and Essex County College (Essex) graduate has been coaching track and field at his alma mater for more than 24 years. In addition to his coaching duties at Essex, Coach Smart has coached teams from the Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Tobago (T&T), St. Vincent & The Grenadines as well as the USA’s 2001 under-25 National Team. He is certified by both the USAT&F (Level 1) and the IAAF. More than 27 of his current and former athletes have represented countries such as Jamaica, Barbados, Grenada, Bahamas and T&T. During his tenure at the helm at Essex, Smart was named National Junior College Coach of the Year an impressive four times and was honored by the NJCAA Region XIX three times. His women’s teams have won the NJCAA National Championship twice (1997, 2000) and placed second nine times. His track program has a 98% graduation rate and over 90%....
07 January 2010	Grenada's Kirani James Enrolls at University of Alabama 265 By Kirani James is now a Crimson Tide. The 17-year-old Grenadian and reigning World Youth 200m (21.05 secs) and 400m (45.24 secs) champion, has enrolled into the University of Alabama and will be competing in this Indoor track season. James became the first youth athlete to complete a 200m/400m double gold at the 2009 IAAF World Youth Championships. Competing at the CARIFTA Games for the third time in 2009 and for the first time in the Under-20 division, James ran a scorching 45.45 to erase Usain Bolt's six-year-old championship record of 46.35. At the University of Alabama, James will be coached by Harvey Glance, who was the head coach of the USA’s 2009 Berlin World Championships team and the sprint coach of the USA’s 2008 Beijing Olympic men’s track team. Glance told Caribbean TrackLife that “Kirani visited three schools: South Carolina University, Florida State University and the University of Alabama. Our coaching staff met with Kirani and his family....
27 January 2010	Bermuda's Aaron Evans Inspired By Bolt 265 By Twenty-year-old Aaron Evans has had a very active youth, playing soccer, cricket and basketball. The Devonshire, Bermuda native played basketball at camps run by his father and played on the Bermudian National Under-13 soccer squad that toured Europe, playing in Holland, Germany and Belgium. But one April night at the 2004 CARIFTA Games in his home country, Aaron witnessed a lanky Jamaican youth demolish both the CARIFTA Games and World Junior 200m records with a scintillating 19.93 secs. That lanky record-breaker was a young Usain “Lighting” Bolt. Aaron also witnessed his friend and countryman Taijuan Talbot capture gold in the Under-17 1500m (4:17.15). These two performances inspired Aaron to take up track and field seriously; one year later, in 2005, he was at the CARIFTA Games in Bacolet, Trinidad competing for Bermuda. Family Aaron was born on Jan. 31, 1990 and has one older brother (Ariell). His father, D....